So Much for the Afterglow
by Nagia
Summary: Denzel learns why he shouldn't break traffic laws on Cloud's watch. [Five years postDoC.] [Heavy Yuffie involvement.]


**Notes:** "Yonic" is the opposite of "Phallic". Also, I want to call Denzel's bike, "Cidifacted." Something might be wrong with me. MORE IMPORTANTLY, I changed the last scene because the Pit won't let me depict an email in correct (or even decipherable) formatting. If you want to read the original, you'll have to go to my writing journal (link located in my profile).

* * *

**So Much for the Afterglow**

* * *

Motorcycles are what sex must be like, Denzel thrills as he takes the small, safe bike that Cid built him out on the road for the first time. The road is a little slick—the rain hasn't dried quite yet—and Tifa put her gloved knuckles in her mouth, but Cloud overrode her insistence that he not try the bike out today.

—_He knows how to drive. As long as he's careful, he should be fine. And the road will dry up soon, anyway._

The last thing Denzel heard before he fired up the bike was Tifa shouting, "When are fifteen year old boys careful, Cloud?!"

And then he was gone, taking Cloud's permission and going as far as he could, free and clear and crazily happy.

He knows he's probably going to be grounded for this once he gets back to Seventh Heaven. Especially after he hears that purring roar of the Fenrir's engine, looks over his shoulder to see Cloud following him. He smiles, nods and pulls into a sharp, dangerous turn. It's a wicked curve, made more so by the wet roads and the speed at which he's moving.

The Fenrir is a mechanical lion's roar behind him, close on his tail. He can almost imagine the mythical wolf nipping at his heels as they speed ahead.

Denzel has always wanted to ride well enough to do the tricks that Cloud does. He's always wanted to _be_ the men of AVALANCHE, a little. They are his heroes in a deeply personal way. They're more like his own personal gods or something.

Cloud guns the engine and passes him, weaving in and out of cars with the very same movements he has always cautioned Denzel against taking. _Do as I say, not as I do_, Denzel thinks but doesn't even try to shout at his mentor. It's so typical of AVALANCHE.

Of most of the members of AVALANCHE, anyway. Vincent has always made damn sure never to pretend that he has the moral high ground, and Yuffie laughs at the very idea of moralizing.

Finally racing down the streets on his very own bike, Denzel learns what it is to laugh the way Yuffie does.

* * *

"Yeah, so now he's grounded, for, like, three months."

"Like three months, huh," Yuffie says to the cell phone speaker, smiling at Vincent as she pulls her shirt back on. Vincent gives her the beginnings of a smile in return, and reaches over to move the cell phone closer to himself.

"He deserved it. He all but ran two red lights and took a lethal curve entirely too fast. He should know better than to try and race Cloud."

Yuffie laughs. "I race Cloud all the time."

"And lose," he says pointedly. His eyes are a burning red flame; the death glare is melting holes in her brain.

"I _never_ lose! I just don't win!"

"You lose alla time, Yuff!"

"Hey!"

Vincent kisses her, gently, finishes buttoning his shirt, and sweeps through the room, trying to find where they tossed his cloak.

"Hey, Yuffie, have you made any more spies wear the suction cup suit?"

Yuffie sighs at the phone. Vincent tiptoes back into the room—his eyes promise that he will tell her where he found the cloak, and ask her not to toss it so far next time—and begins to smile as she tells Marlene, "Actually, Reeve made me retire it, as it treads too close to sexual harassment."

"What? Why?"

"Because it's skin tight and stretchy and covered with suction cups, which are probably a yonic symbol or something."

"A_what_?"

"Nevermind," says Vincent hurriedly, glaring eyes searing her skin. "Yuffie is being silly. Why did you ask about the suction cup suit?"

"Because I thought if maybe Denzel wore it for a day, then he wouldn't have to be grounded for three months."

It's a good plan, Yuffie thinks. Humiliating him after such a monumental mistake—not, of course, that she doesn't drive the same way, but she's been driving since she was seventeen, and he hasn't—might give him the idea that he shouldn't do dumb things. At least not on Cloud's watch.

* * *

Yuffie and Vincent arrive at Seventh Heaven for weekly dinner exactly on time that Friday. Yuffie has a paper bag in one hand, which she has tied closed. Vincent wears a secretive half smile and actually chuckles during dinner.

During dessert, he tells Denzel and Marlene the story of how Yuffie saved his life during the Deepground incident. They have heard the story many times, from both his mouth and Yuffie's, but they never tire of hearing it.

He supposes they like it because Yuffie is the youngest member of AVALANCHE, the child-woman among them. The one closest to the orphans in age. And it is easy for them to see themselves in her place, someday.

Only when dessert is over, the stories are all told, and the dishes have been done—it is Vincent who washes, Yuffie who dries, as their private tradition goes—that Yuffie takes the bag out of the foyer and smiles cheerfully, the way she does when she's giving gifts.

"Denzel, I have a present for you," she croons, moving into the living room.

Denzel visibly perks at the first good news he's heard in six days. Vincent watches him, and his smile grows just a little larger.

That poor boy.

Once Denzel is seated in the living room, Yuffie touches the ribbon that ties the bag's handles closed. "This is the best kind of gift at all. It'll get you out of being grounded."

Denzel's eyes go wide.

Marlene looks at Yuffie, smiles widely, and then must stuff the knuckles of both her hands in her mouth to keep from cackling.

"What is it?" The teen asks, almost breathlessly.

"That's for me and Vincent to know and you to find out."

She slides the paper bag to him. He unties the ribbon, then retrieves a Midgarian Cockatrice gift box from it. The largish box opens to reveal a black one-piece suit, covered in suction cups. There are even one size fits none slippers, also covered in suction cups.

"That's the Bad Spy Suction Cup Suit!" Yuffie crows.

Marlene claps. Tifa looks at the thing with a mixture of amusement and dismay, while Cloud's expression doesn't change… much. Vincent sees him turn to hide his smile.

Denzel's voice is both put upon and confused. "What the hell is _that_?"

"Okay, used to be, when my agents made really stupid mistakes in the field, as long as they weren't injured, I'd make them wear that suit for a whole day at the office." A cheeky grin. "I find that humiliation provides the best motivation for improvement. 'course, now I can't do that, because it's 'inhumane', but I really think Reeve just doesn't want to be sued."

Denzel goes stark white. "You mean _old people_ wore this?!"

"Yep! But don't worry, it's clean. Anyway, if you can wear that for a whole day without complaining, and then show that you know what your mistakes were, then they'll un-ground you."

Vincent watches the gears in Denzel's head turn. He's trying to weigh the humiliation of wearing that ugly suit versus the joy of his punishment ending.

"Is it true?" The boy flashes a look to Tifa. At her nod, he goes even paler. "I'll never live it down if I do, will I?"

Vincent speaks up as soon as he can quash the smile. For a moment, he almost misses his cape; once he moved into Yuffie's apartment, Tifa demanded he hang up his cape when he entered the bar. "Why avoid one day of humiliation to end three months of punishment?"

It's a good point and he can see that Denzel knows it.

"When do I have to do it?"

"You can choose any day you like," Cloud says with a straight face.

They really are being quite sadistic to this poor boy.

"Then I could do it tomorrow?"

"Yeah, but no hiding in your room all day! This isn't supposed to be a _painless_ punishment, got it?" Yuffie's voice has an understandable manic cheer to it.

"Consider this punishment to be a compression of your three months," Vincent adds.

The boy looks down at the ridiculous suit and sighs. "Then I'll do it. But only one day, and tomorrow, okay?"

"I won't make you help out in the bar tomorrow," Tifa offers.

That's probably the only concession to the suit that anyone is going to make, Vincent thinks.

* * *

Yuffie walks into Seventh Heaven entirely expecting to see Tifa handling the bar by herself, with Cloud lounging by the door as the bouncer. And she's right, only Marlene is laughing in the kitchen, and Denzel is standing next to Cloud at the door.

Yuffie does a mental rewind of the last few moments. But nope, Denzel is there in all of them, and as she snaps her focus back to the present, he's still here. It tempts her to turn around, walk out, and walk right back in again, just to make sure it's all real.

"Denzel volunteered to help in the bar in exchange for staying in his room for the rest of the day."

She smiles and nods.

* * *

As she does every morning once Cid had his tea, Shera Highwind boots up their sleek, too-new desktop computer and logs onto their private wireless network. A few clicks, a few keystrokes, and she is checking her official email address at Rocket Town Flight School.

In her inbox, its subject bolded, is an email from Yuffie. Shera opens it, reads it, and then views the attached pictures.

She doesn't usually talk to her husband in the morning, who is entirely too far from being a morning person to have his tea interrupted, but this email is going to have to be an exception. Her smile stretches from ear to ear, and she almost forgets about the fact that one of the assistant instructors is going to have to teach her classes today, as she has mechanical work to do on the newest airship prototype.

"Cid!" She cries.

Cid grunts from the kitchen.

"Cid, please, you have to see this! It's from Yuffie!"

As he nears her, his grunting becomes mumbled words: "…still can't believe… abusin' my work…" Then, louder, "This about Denzel?"

Shera nods. "She took pictures!"

He nearly drops his mug. "Mother a' fuck! Lemme see those!"

She stands from the chair, lets him sit down and review them. Just a few moments later, he guffaws and points to the data at the top of the email.

"That's m' girl," he says, "thief n' a liar!"

"Why, what did she do?"

In the cold, almost lonely feeling of the early morning, his blue eyes stare at her, chill her. "Y'mean apart from take pictures n' send 'em to us?"

He continues right over her blushing response with an almost lusty grin. "She sent 'em to Reeve."

* * *

EL FIN


End file.
